Former 3L sues after being kicked out of law school for alleged plagiarism
A former third-year law student claims in a lawsuit that the University of Nebraska College of Law discriminated against him and violated his constitutional rights when he was kicked out of school for alleged plagiarism.
Layth Mohammad Al-Turk claims discrimination on the basis of his Arabic heritage and Muslim beliefs, the Associated Press reports. He also claims the school violated his right to due process. He was dismissed in February; he had been scheduled to graduate in August.
The suit says Al-Turk was accused of failing to attribute parts of a paper that he had turned in as a rough draft after his computer failed, according to the AP account. Al-Turk says he tried to negotiate a settlement, but his efforts were rejected. He filed the suit on Tuesday in Nebraska federal court.
According to the suit, the law school had negotiated settlements for honor code violations with other students that imposed sanctions short of dismissal during the last five years. In those instances, “said students were comprised largely of Caucasian students who were not Muslim,” the complaint states.
